How I Managed To Fuck Up This Week’s Long Run. I Don’t Actually Have A Fucking Clue What I’m Doing.

Today was the day of my long run and I kinda ruined it for myself from the start. I delayed the run until after the Spurs v Liverpool so that I wouldn’t encounter any trouble on the train up to Hertfordshire.

I had the bright idea of having a Lickin Chicken variety box meal for lunch and took the whole “carb-loading” fucking idiocy to the next level and had 4 Sainsbury’s Triple Chocolate Cookies as dessert.

1,600 calories in that dessert alone. Jesus.

After the cookies I kinda just lay in bed for about half an hour in a state of sugar induced bliss. I was seriously fucked up from the rush and knew I had to at least make an attempt at burning them off with the run.

An ill fated journey into the heart of Herts.

The aim was to get the 5:40 to Hertford East from Tottenham Hale and jog back before it got dark. Unfortunately the Hertford East train does not leave from Hale on Sundays for some strange reason. I’d have to change at either Cheshunt or Broxbourne and then connect from there.

I just wanted to turn back and walk home up High Road.

The main issue is that I knew that I didn’t have enough time to get back from Hertfordshire along the towpath before it got dark. Ever since my 100k experience I’ve become really quite frightened of running at night and I didn’t want to risk drowning in the canal.

I really do like living these days, despite what you’re about to read next.

Anyway, once again my piss poor planning had fucked everything up for me and I just sunk into self pity.

Wanker.

I ended up jumping on the Cambridge train and getting off at Broxbourne where I immediately started jogging south back towards London. The only problem was that I had no fucking clue how to get onto the towpath from that station. I spent 10 minutes jogging around a car park, slapping myself on the head out of pure fucking frustration.

I wanted to give up after a mile as I seemed to be running into dead end after dead end. On what seemed like the 100th fucking attempt I found the towpath heading down towards Waltham Abbey.

It was a pretty miserable run. I like to think that I’ve come a long way in recent years in terms of enjoying myself out there. This was just really very painful.

I’ve ran for 5 days in a row now and I could swear that my feet have swollen to be a size larger than usual. It’s so bad that the top of my feet were scraping against the toebox and it was agony.

Since it was quite a nice night there were loads of alcoholics out along the canal drinking Special Brew and stray dogs wandering around the path. I just didn’t have the energy to even be angry at them.

So I gave up.

I stopped just short of the Edmonton incinerator coming back in towards Tottenham. My mood changed a little as I walked by the moonlit River Lea and the voice in my head had died.

Despite fucking up the run it’s been a good week and tonight’s 10 miler has helped a little. The situation could be a lot worse. Some asshole could have spotted me slapping myself on the head in Broxbourne and had me sectioned down at Tooting Bec.

I could have just sat in bed and ate more cookies.

My aim has was to try to run 50 miles at an average pace of 6.6 mph which is roughly the speed of a sub 4 hour marathon. Training at that level is difficult. When you try to combine both speed and distance that’s when your body and your mind begin to break.

And although both did break to a certain extent today, I’m glad I carried through with the run.

This week I ran 40.6 miles at an average pace of 6.6 mph. This is not counting my 48:50 10k on the treadmill on Wednesday either.

2 Responses

Hey man, I only catch your posts on occasion but when I do I always enjoy them. It’s hard as hell sometimes but looking at the bigger picture is hugely important. Sounds like you are doing a damn good job of keeping that in mind. Solid work out there!